Elburn man sentenced to 37 years in prison for child sexual exploitation

An Elburn man was sentenced to 37 years in prison after pleading guilty to sexually exploiting nearly 100 children last year.

Shaun Healy, 45, was arrested in 2022 after authorities discovered he often posed as a teenage girl on social media sites to befriend actual young girls and persuade them to send him explicit images and videos.

Prosecutors said Healy gave his victims “step-by-step instructions” and then would extort the girls later if they didn’t produce additional images and videos.

Detectives uncovered a password-protected album on Healy’s cellphone containing dozens of “carefully organized” folders of the images and videos from each child.

The sentence was announced late last week, authorities said.

Healy’s crimes came to light when Kane County authorities were notified by an Indiana mother who learned her 14-year-old daughter was being exploited. Healy’s victims included girls in other states and even Canada, court papers show. Federal prosecutors took over the case in 2023.